


Were It Not That I Have Bad Dreams

by katsidhe



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Cage Trauma, Gen, Hell Trauma, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Implied/Referenced Torture, Nightmares, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Season/Series 12
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-27
Updated: 2017-11-27
Packaged: 2019-02-07 12:28:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,448
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12841185
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/katsidhe/pseuds/katsidhe
Summary: Sometimes, Sam has nightmares.Set sometime in Season 12.Written for the Nov 2017 Comment Meme at ohsam.





	Were It Not That I Have Bad Dreams

  
_He’s cold. He’s on his back. He hurts, all over. His face is somehow numb and in horrific pain, all at once. He’s too stiff and weak to move, and every gasping breath he takes sets off a flare of lancing agony that arcs up through his chest, making his eyes sting and more tears leak out. There is a hand carding through his hair. It’s gentle. He doesn’t have the energy to flinch away._

_“What will it be, Sam? Your ball game today, or not?”_

_His stomach drops, and he tries to turn his head away despite himself. The hand in his hair tightens, just a little bit, not to hurt, just to keep his face upturned._

_“C’mon, roomie, you know the rules. Pick your poison.”_

_“P-please.” His voice cracks._

_“It’s your choice, Sam. I know that’s important to you. Yes or no?"_

_He feels his face twist, involuntary, a shudder. “I-I don’t know. Please.”_

_“Not even gonna give it the old college try?”_

_He forces open his mouth, but can’t summon words._

_“Hm. Perfectly understandable. In that case, I’m happy to think up something new.”_

_His stomach curdles, he fumbles to lift beseeching arms, he chokes on the pain, rasps, “Wait. Wait.”_

_A heavy pause. “What’s the magic word?”_

_The purring satisfaction in the question makes him sick, makes his broken feet curl inward._

_“Yes,” he croaks._

_“Up and at ‘em, then, tiger."_

_He forces himself to his knees, weathers the pain, lets it crest and plateau. Crawls forward on fragmented shins. He doesn’t need to look up to know where he’s going. He stops in the center of the Cage._

_He lifts his head, blinks to clear tears and blood from his vision, and accepts the proffered knife with a shuddering hand._

_“Your old record is nine hours, twenty-one minutes. I think you can make ten this time.”_

_He positions the blade. Takes a shaky breath in. Holds. Lets it out on a short sob, as he draws the knife down his abdomen, slowly, in a wavering vertical slice. Ten hours to go._

 

  
Sam wakes up curled into himself, his fists clutched to his stomach and his face wet (tears, not blood). The bedsheets are tangled around his legs (linen, not chains). He’s gasping and sobbing like it just happened, like Lucifer's hands are still on him, like it wasn’t just another fucked-up dream in a long line of fucked-up dreams (memories, not dreams).

It takes long, shuddering minutes before he musters the energy to force himself to uncurl and stand. He scrubs his hands roughly over his face and glances at the clock. 4:13 am— that’s late enough to conceivably be up, early enough Dean will still be asleep. He moves on shaking legs, out of his room (where Lucifer stayed, not so long ago) to the kitchen, focusing on his bare feet against the concrete floor and breathing deep to keep from crying again. 

Sound and motion and light. He freezes in the doorway to the kitchen.

 

* * *

 

Dean’s given up on sleep for the night. Mom’s gone, Lucifer's in the wind, the British are a bunch of poncy assholes, and altogether he just can’t bring himself to lie in bed and stare at the ceiling anymore tonight. This morning. Whatever.

He's rummaging through the coffee cabinet when he hears a scuffing noise. He jerks around, reflex, but it’s just Sam. Sam who’s standing pale and frozen, lingering half in the dimness of the hallway, staring into the brightness of the kitchen like it’s going to bite him.

Dean's surprise gives way to alarm. “Sam. Hey, whoa—hey. You, ah. You okay?"

Sam jerks and clears his throat, wide eyes focusing on Dean, which Dean is willing to count as a win. “Yeah. Yeah, no, just—just wanted something to drink,” he says. His voice is hoarse and wrecked.

Dean moves to him, makes to take his arm without thinking. His brother flinches away from his touch like it burns. Sam closes his eyes and pulls away, half-collapsing into the wall, breaths jagged, raising his arms weakly in something like surrender. Something cold and sick twists in Dean’s gut. “Sam. It’s just me."

A few long, long moments pass, but he doesn’t try to touch Sam again. Finally, with visible effort, Sam opens his eyes and says, a little too deliberately, “Dean. Sorry. I’m fine." He forces a twisted little half-smile that Dean’s sure is meant to be reassuring, but has exactly the opposite effect.

Dean backs up a little further before offering his hand again. “Fine, right. Yeah, try that line when you aren’t hugging the kitchen wall. Sit down, okay?”

 This time, Sam takes the help, and Dean levers him fully upright. This close, Dean can feel him trembling. Together, they make it to the kitchen table, and Sam shakily lowers himself into a chair. He’s staring at the table like he can’t meet Dean’s eyes. 

Dean clears his throat. "You sound like you just gargled marbles. I’ll grab you some water.”

Sam jolts a little, but when he looks up he’s more present. “Um, yeah. Thanks.” 

Dean grabs the glass, fills it, keeps up a running monologue. “Honestly, best thing about this place is the water. None of that nasty, tepid shit from motel faucets. Like rinsing your mouth out with lukewarm armpits."

He turns. Sam’s back to looking at the table like it personally wronged him. “Your water. Unless you wanted it in, like, a crystal goblet or whatever."

“Actually, it’d be great if you added some cucumber slices.” Sam’s still not looking up, but he’s with it enough to bitch. There, basic cognitive function verified.

“Yeah, you wish, princess.” Dean sits across from him. Sam wraps a big hand around the glass, but he doesn’t move to drink. "So. Nightmare, or something else?”

“Just a nightmare.” Sam finally takes a sip of water. 

“They’re getting worse, lately.” It’s not a question. Ever since Lucifer invaded the bunker, filling the warded hallways with his petulant cruelty and bad music, Dean’s imagined a change to the atmosphere. A chill aftertaste of power in the air, a fetid prickle of unease that lingered long after the asshole was gone. And if he’s feeling it, he can’t conceive what Sam’s feeling. Whenever he wonders, he's been picturing Alastair sitting in the map room and quickly deciding he really doesn’t _want_ to conceive it.  

Sam just shrugs, though. 

“You wanna. You know. If you want to talk about it.” _Please don’t tell me,_ Dean thinks, _I don’t want to know._

Sam finally looks up at him, his forehead creased in a half-frown. “You don’t want to talk about it.”

Dean manages a little laugh. It’s not funny. “Yeah, but maybe it’d be, y’know, good for you. What with him being out and about, and everything.”

Sam looks back down, and Dean figures that’s the end of the after-school special. But then Sam speaks. "He liked to give me choices, sometimes.” 

Dean's spine prickles. “Yeah?” he hears himself say. 

Sam’s voice is too soft and even, too conversational. But his eyes are glassy and far away, and the look on his face makes Dean go cold. “I mean. They weren’t choices. Not really. But then, then he could say. Would say that I chose it, what he did. What he—made me do. Because I said yes." 

Dean’s throat closes. He thinks about _choices_ , in Hell, and doesn’t trust himself to move without screaming, or maybe sobbing. 

Sam takes another drink of water, and bends his head back down. Like he’s fucking _embarrassed_ that he’s messed up about this shit. “Anyway, I—I think it’s just worse right now because—well, like you said. And there’s Mom and the British to worry about too. But I’m okay, really—"

Dean finds his voice. “You didn’t.”

Sam stops his ramble. “Didn’t what?” he says uncertainly. 

“You didn’t choose it, okay. Whatever he said,” Dean says. “Just. He’s a lying asshole, that’s all." 

Sam opens his mouth, and closes it again. His mouth twists at the corner.  

Dean’s on a roll, now, because he needs to wipe that sick, wounded look off Sam’s face. “And we are gonna kick his ass back to the Cage. For good this time. Or who knows, maybe the stick up the Brits' collective asses is gonna turn out to be an archangel blade, and you can stab him right in the smarmy face.” 

Sam’s got a weird, pinched expression, and for a second Dean isn’t sure if he’s going to laugh or cry. Then, his mouth curves up in a smile, a real one this time. “Sounds good to me, Dean."

 

 


End file.
